AUGUSTA, Ga. — It’s the unkindest cut of all.
Playing only the first two rounds in the Masters – after waiting nearly nine months for the first men’s major championship of the year to arrive and then absorbing the magical setting and all the Southern delicacies at Augusta National Golf Club – is extra painful for those who ply their trade on various professional golf tours around the world.
Geoff Ogilvy, the 2006 U.S. Open champion, echoed his peers’ thoughts when he often said he started to look forward to the next Masters as soon as he drove off Magnolia Lane when that year’s event was over.
Thus, many of the game’s best players started thinking ahead to the 2023 Masters on Friday after slamming the trunk. The cut came at +4.
The top 50 and ties advanced to weekend play – a total of 52 players. Here are the notables who won’t be playing the weekend at Augusta National.
After an uneven 74 in the first round, the 2015 Masters champion had worked his way back to 1-over par Friday and just five shots out of the lead when he stepped to the 12th tee. Remember, this is where he dumped two balls into Rae’s Creek in the final round of the 2016 Masters, his resulting quadruple-bogey 7 wiping out his entire five-shot lead he took to the back nine on Sunday; he wound up second. Well, Spieth dumped two more balls into Rae’s Creek in the second round and made triple. His final-hole double bogey sent him packing with a 76.
The four-time major champion, who had 12 top 10s in his last 16 starts in a major, made just one birdie in each of his two rounds and went home after two scores of 75. Finishing with two bogeys in the first round and three bogeys in his last five holes in his second round proved costly. He continues his march toward finding his best form from the past.
The 2020 U.S. Open winner has now played just 13 rounds this year as he’s battled hand, wrist and hip injuries. He has little control on his driver – which along with his putter were his best weapons after he bulked up – and this has put a severe strain on the rest of his game. After opening with a 76, he made just one birdie in the second round and signed for his first-ever 80 on the PGA Tour.
The gold medalist, who was two shots out of the lead standing on the tee box of the 16th hole in last year’s final round before dumping a ball into the pond and making a triple-bogey 6 to finish in a tie for third, made just one – one – birdie in 36 holes. The top-10 machine in majors did not earn his 10th with scores of 74-77.
Coming off a win in the Valspar Championship, his third in year, and noted as a supreme ball-striker, Burns was talked about as one of the favorites. But he made four bogeys and double bogey in a first-round 75 and added four more bogeys in his second-round 74 to finish one shot shy of making the cut.
The Champions Tour monster and two-time Masters champion was 63 when he became the oldest player to make the cut at the Masters in 2020. But at 64, he couldn’t pull off the magic once again with consecutive 76s.
The Englishman’s game has been on the downward cycle for some time now, his last win coming in the 2019 Farmers Insurance Open. But the 2013 U.S. Open champion seems to perk up at Augusta National – he finished in a tie for second in 2015 and lost in a playoff to Sergio Garcia in 2017. Not this year. A pair of 76s sent him home early and he’ll continue to try and regain his past form.